It occurred to my wife and me today as we were looking at the growing clutter of political campaign signs springing up in North Texas that we no longer have just “two political parties.”
Yeah, we still have Democrats and Republicans. The two parties have morphed into four of them. Or at least two of them have become variations of the formal parties.
We have Democrats, Republicans … and progressives and (for lack of a better description) Donald Trump cultists.
To be clear, we don’t see many Democrats in North Texas bellowing their “progressive” credentials, given that there are few progressives among the rank-and-file voters. We do see on the other side a good number of Republicans advertising their “conservative” leanings. Collin County Judge Chris Hill, for instance, calls himself a “Texas conservative.”
Still, as I look at the bigger picture, I perceive an expanding of the two-party base, that the political battlefield is sprinkled with “troops” from the progressive and conservative wings within both major political parties.
For those who wish we could expand our political lineup beyond just Democrat and Republican, they might be getting their wish.